Do any of you ladies have experience being a stepparent in circumstances that go totally against your beliefs? How do you deal with it?

My husband's first wife is a former Irish Catholic woman who, for reasons neither my husband or I can figure out, converted to Judaism shortly after their divorce. She's Orthodox, moreover, and is raising their daughter that way. After their divorce, she changed their daughter's name to a blatantly Jewish name and put her in a Hebrew day school. My husband fought tooth and nail against this, and even took her to court, but she's not technically doing anything illegal and they didn't specify anything about religion in their parenting plan because both were atheists at the time.

When we first married, I was allowed to spend time with his daughter, but now that his ex-wife is remarried (to a Rabbi) my husband is not allowed to spend hardly any time with his daughter and I'm not allowed to see her at all, ever, because I'm a "contaminating influence." (Because I'm a proud white woman with tattoos who does not dress modestly or cover my hair.)

In recent months, the last time I was allowed to spend time with my stepdaughter, she was obviously being neglected by her mother. She was wearing dirty old smelly clothing (but it was "modest" and that's the important part to her mother) and very thin and her hair and teeth were not brushed (she's 8.) She was hungry and my husband and I bought her food but her mother stopped us at the door and said she wasn't allowed to have it even though it was kosher because now that she was remarried, my stepdaughter could only eat food koshered in Israel. My husband's ex-wife lives on disability and her daughter's child support (her husband does not work, he only studies the Torah) and cannot even pay their utility bills some months, I can't imagine how she's supposed to be ordering "special" food from Israel. Any rate, I called child services to check on the house and they said I had filed a false report and there was "nothing wrong" in the home. Bull! Now my husband's ex will only allow us extremely restricted time with my stepdaughter and I'm not even allowed to see her at all. If he gets visitation, I have to take our son and leave while she's here.

Ladies, how would you deal with this? My stepdaughter is a smart, funny, beautiful young white lady and she deserves SO much better than this. How do we fight this? Do we have a legal leg to stand on to get custody or are we going to get shot down by the PC police?

I do not wish to disparage the hozen for their aspirations - each race must walk its own path. In this moment, however, they are bringing harm to our bodies and our culture. That is a line that cannot be crossed. - Elder Shaopai, "Tools of the Enemy"

The family court system is a joke so the outcome of any case is really hit or miss. It doesn't hurt to try for better arrangements though. Sometimes they actually rule in the best interests of the child.